Graduate jobs to suffer from pay freezes

Graduate pay rises in the coming year will be the lowest in a decade, increasing by just 0.5 per cent, according to a new report.

Incomes Data Services' paper suggests that the average graduate starting salary will be £24,500, with one in two employers freezing initial pay.

"This is the lowest forecast increase that we have seen since IDS started reporting comparable data on graduate pay in 1999. Not even during the dot-com crash was there such a small increase in graduate salaries," comments Jessica Evans, the report's author.

It also suggests that thousands of companies are also planning to reduce the number of graduates they hire this year, with law, accountancy and manufacturing firms lowering graduate recruitment.

However, it also states that the public sector is planning to increase graduate jobs by 30.1 per cent.

Recent research by Tesco highlighted that the top three graduate jobs with the highest earning potential for workers are management consultancy, retail and IT systems analysis.